The largest U.S. offshore wind-generating facility will be built off the Texas coast near Padre Island, Texas officials announced Thursday in Austin. Texas Land Commissioner Jerry Patterson praised what he said would be a 40,000-acre area of turbines about 120 meters tall and able to generate energy to power 125,000 homes. “We want to be number one. We want to attract the businesses that build the turbines, that build the blades,” he said. “We want to be the leader in the United States, if not the world.” Houston-based Superior Renewable Energy Incorporated would build the facility and pay the estimated $1 billion to $2 billion construction costs. The offshore wind facility is the second announced in less than a year for the Texas coast. The country's largest currently operating wind facility is along the Oregon-Washington state border, and it generates about 300 megawatts of electricity. Wind facility plans also have caused disputes, including a bitter battle over a proposed 130-turbine wind facility off the Massachusetts coast, where the residents fear the turbines will be ugly. The Padre Island wind facility is already proving controversial because it is located in a critical migratory bird flyway. Some environmentalists say the promise of clean energy may not be worth the deaths of countless birds that migrate through the area each year on their way to and from winter grounds in Mexico and Central America. “You probably couldn't pick a worse location, unless you're trying to settle the issue as to how damaging they are to migratory birds,” local environmentalist Walter Kittleberger was quoted as saying by the Associated Press.
